World Vision Malawi has pumped in K12.5 million into the preliminary stages of primary schools quiz competition which drew the participation of 17 schools up to the finals together with the prizes given to the winners.
The first of its kind, the quiz started with the spelling programme and built into the quiz programme and has been helped learners to intensify on reading books.
They have also developed interest in reading and discovering more from the books and has seen an improvement in team work.
The children’s charity organization core target is to ensure they are able to read and write at an appropriate age.
Despite this ambition that every child at school going age should be in class, unfortunately they’re still some children roaming in the villages during classes as revealed by the organisation’s programme manager for Lilongwe district Harold Munthali.
World Vision is working with community and school leaders in ensuring that parents who are keeping their wards at home should attend classes.
Some of the contributing factors are that some parents don’t value education and would rather send children on other errands.
However the organization is working with chiefs to ensure they put in place by laws to reverse the trend.
“As World Vision for the past three years, we’ve been running a campaign on ending child marriages. We’ve really worked with community groups who have brought in the by-laws. We’ve worked with the police, the social welfare office to curb this challenge.
“However we realize that these children that are entering marriages at an early age, there are some push factors that are there so we are trying to address those ones.
“For example, ensuring that there’s a conducive learning environment in schools where we are assisting the Ministry of Education to ensure that there are adequate learning spaces in schools to ensure that even for girls they’re conducive ablution facilities. So we are constructing seven hole latrines which these girls they can be using when they go to school if they need to access those ones.”
In addition, children are being empowered to enable them appreciate the importance of education.
Despite these efforts, they’re still other children going into early marriages and World Vision said it will not relent but work with the relevant structures in ensuring that all children that are supposed to be in class they should be going back to school.
World Vision withdrew 27 children from early marriages and have been re-integrated back to school in Traditional Authority Chitekwere under Nkhoma Area programme from October 2022 to October 2023.
Some children are yet to be rescued and World Vision is working with relevant offices so that all of them go back to school.
Chief Education officer for Lilongwe rural east Jeniffer Chilunga spoke on projects which have helped in the construction of classroom blocks and toilets to improve the learning environment.
She cited the National numeracy and literacy programme which is training teachers on how to improve on education delivery with a goal to improve education quality in the schools.
Another one is on building foundation through innovation and technology whereby the learning programme is being digitalized and learners use personalized tablets to offer lessons to individuals at their own pace and are delivered by the Ministry.
Through the processes, gaps have been identified and through collaborative efforts they are being rectified.
“One of the gaps that we have noted through this quiz competition is that there are other learners that do not even have even a single person in their homes who can help them so because of that, there is a programme that we have also devised; a digital way of helping the learners that when they go home, they identify somebody in the community who can be helping these learners”.
One of the pupils Movwiri Luhana from Nkhoma primary school says through the quiz competition, he has learned a lot of things and it is encouraging them to read.
“I encourage my friends to work hard in class for them to have a brighter future and not to be poor. When I grow up, I want to be a policeman for me to be able to protect people from all sorts of robbery and vandalism.”
